SOCIOL 1A06 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Cash Transfers, Unemployment Benefits, Sandwich Generation
12 Dec 2016
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Definitions of families and marriage and implications. Definitions of family shape government social policy and inform the decisions we make about how to live our lives. Ground has shifted tremendously- conception of family has widened. Reasons why this issue of how we define a family is important because it impacts social policy and private decisions we make on how we choose to live. Government relies on very specific definitions of family- historically this has excluded many types of families=consequences: receiving government help or benefits. You can collect insurance benefits for a family member who is terminally ill and very close to dying. Excludes same sex partners and extended family, siblings, grandparents. Expanded family definitions because of social scrutiny to government. As long as the person can make the case that the person is a family member you can receive the benefits. Social policy sometimes embeds how a family should be.
